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HomeShop at BookSurgeTravelCanadaTerritories & Nunavut (NT, NU, YT)Show-Me Kings: Bootheel Ball, The Cookson Clan, & A Run- And- Gun All-Star Show |
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| Customer Reviews: | | Average Customer Review: ( 5 customer reviews )
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8 of 8 found the following review helpful:
Bottom of the net Feb 02, 2006
By unclegrubworm
Show-Me Kings is a hard-to-put down fast read for all high school hoops junkies and a special treat for fans of small-town Missouri ball. The book focuses on the teams that put Scott County Central High School on the high school basketball map by winning 12 Missouri championships in 18 years in the late '70s through the early '90s, an accomplishment unparalleled in state history.
Mitchell obviously put a lot of work into researching this effort and it shows in his dribble-by-dribble re-creations of Scott County's key contests. He relies heavily on press reports of the games, but he also draws skillfully from interviews of players and coaches to add color, insight, and emotion to his descriptions. Many of his game accounts have a real you-are-there feel to them.
One of the book's more intriguing aspects is the relationship of Ron Cookson, Scott County's demanding country boy coach, and his players, most of whom are black descendants of Missouri Bootheel sharecroppers. The strong bond between player and coach became a seemingly limitless source of energy for Scott County Central's teams, and it carried them to title after title.
Mitchell provides context by presenting a brief history of the Bootheel, one of the state's most distinctive regions. He delves into the checkered race relations of its past, dirty laundry for some but a key to understanding the significance of Scott County's triumphs and Cookson's reciprocated love for his players.
Basketball has long been the #1 sport in southeast Missouri, and Mitchell incorporates the exploits of some of the area's other prominent teams and coaches of the period. A real bonus is his tracing back the basketball lineage of Scott County and other great southeast Missouri teams of the recent past to the legendary fast-breaking, full-court pressing teams of the early '50s from Puxico High School, probably the most renowned high school basketball teams in state history and among the best in the nation during that era.
It is clear that Mitchell believes that basketball in the Missouri Bootheel has been much more than a recreational activity. It has become a source of pride for the area, changed the perceptions of many of its residents, and perhaps even altered the fabric of its society. Show-Me Kings is a very good basketball book, but it's even more than that.
7 of 7 found the following review helpful:
More Than A Regional Story Jan 31, 2006
By Doug Sanders
"Doug"
Fantastic book. While the chronicles of a high school basketball dynasty is riveting, I was more amazed at Mitchell's examination of history. He makes you realize how everything is connected. I never thought about how hundreds of years of earthquakes, floods, boll weevils, railroad building, civil rights and religion could explain where everyone lived in Southeast Missouri, and how little decisions, like a man I had never heard of 50 miles from my home town coaching basketball for the first time in 1945, could explain why my high school would never defeat a smaller school just 12 miles away for 50 years. I like books that make you think, and this book makes you think.
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
Mitchell Madness!! Feb 04, 2006
By Funbobby66
Excellent book. Mitchell truly takes you inside a small town and shows you how SO many different aspects of life can change the way a town thinks, feels and treasures life.
I am already buying copies for friends and family.
A well thought out book that nailed a three pointer!
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Mitchell Bangs a Three Pointer!! Apr 05, 2006
By D. Turner
Being from the Southeast Missouri region and being familiar with many characters of the book made it a "must read" for me. I will admit, my expectations were high, but Mitchell exceeded them with Show-Me Kings. An excellent book about small town Southeast Missouri baketball and how the sport brings a cohesiveness to a community. But, it is more than a book about small town basketball dynasties led by SEMO small town legendary coaches, Ron Cookson and his older brother Carroll Cookson, it is a study into the history of that little region of the state commonly called "the bootheel". It is a great book to share with those you love.
 Smalltown Life and Basketball Feb 04, 2006
By J. Pennington
When I ordered this book, I expected to receive a "Hoosiers" type story regarding another small, out of the way, high school basketball team that overcame long odds to win a championship. I would have been very happy with that. But I was even more pleasantly surprised to find that the book served as more of a study of smalltown life and high school sports in America.
Having never been to the Bootheel area of Missouri, I came to this book with no history, no background, and no roadmap. But Mike Mitchell masterfully led me through the ups and downs of the region... weaving stories of families and floods, civic pride and civic strife into a fine collage of Sports Americana.
I had never spent much time thinking about the ways in which local sports affect a region... and the ways that a region affects its local sports. This book was an eye-opener.
Four stars for making me want to do a little research into the sports history of my OWN corner of the world.
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